tommyrod74

I remember the stuff that passed for "suspension" in 1991 when Bob Roll was on a Softride parallelogram stem and a Allsop beam bike with a Ritchey frame. My first race bike had a Manitou 1. I remember stuffing Englund air damper cartridges into RS Judys after blowing up the stock damper for the umpteenth time. I totally agree that it's light-years ahead of where it began, and its a huge part of why modern bikes are so good.

My point was that, up to 2-3 years ago, the suspension was basically dialed but you could still buy a 150mm travel bike with a 70 degree head angle and a 72 degree seat angle, high BB, etc. The suspension worked well - but it was totally out of its element at speed.

Now you can get a 100mm travel bike with a 68 degree HA, 74 degree SA, low BB, long TT, clearance for wide tires... so much faster everywhere. Even with 2/3 the travel. And mine (Kona Hei Hei carbon) weighs 23 lbs ready to ride, with real tires.

I agree that many (most?) of the high-end bikes get demoed in a parking lot with poorly set up suspension. I just meant there's really no excuse for it - it's not very hard to get it right (or at least close) and teaching the customer how to adjust it is time well spent.

Remote lockouts are very nice. the current bike has a fair bit of anti-squat in the kinematics and pedals very well without the remote. I usually run the suspension full-open unless on a fire road climb. I'm unsure if I'd like the added weight and complexity on this particular bike - plus, no remote for a Fox 34, and I've grown very fond of the stiffness that fork provides in technical terrain.

My other point was that the word salad typed by Miyata Man re: suspension setup sounded like someone who has read every freaking geek-out suspension setup post on MTBR and Pinkbike, but only ridden a bike in the woods twice. Literally none of it made any sense, to the point where it seemed intentionally abstruse.

rubiksoval

This has been pointed out repeatedly. Apparently he takes great pride in this. Kind of his calling card on this forum, if you will.

rubiksoval

Every time I think I'm going to start training again, I don't.

I did manage a 5 min test last week and hit the same 5 min pr I've had for the last four years. So that was nice/surprising, but then I got a chest cold that same evening, so it wasn't worth the effort.

mFTP is barely above 300 and CTL is 60 something since I've only done 2-3 rides over two hours in the last couple of months. Hard to get going again.

Keep thinking of just reupping my Zwift subscription and doing a race for 30-45 minutes a day... But then there's the whole getting dropped by cat Cs and Ds all the time. Maybe I should just set my weight at 50 kgs or something. Ah.

Mental barriers.

hubcyclist

I hear ya, I'm nowhere near your league, but I somehow stink in the C's and still exceed the power limit, I got dinged out the other day on zwiftpower for riding 3.2w/kg, then I did a B race later this past week at 3.5 and finished near the bottom as well (spent first min at 120% and first 5 mins at 108% so clearly I need to work on riding harder, though I doubt that'll help me get in contention). But I still find them fun and motivational (I have podiumed a couple of times, 2nd place finish only had 9 racers, and a 3rd place against 7, I guess I just have to pick some off-peak events lol)

rubiksoval

Do you have a smart trainer? I'm wondering if that makes any sort of difference.

I race against two guys who are both 1s that have both won a ZTR or KISS or whatever A race and both of them had smarttrainers.

Maybe I just really suck at video games/ indoor training.

But I also really want a Diretto...

hubcyclist

I do, I have the cycleops hammer, which is awesome (the direto is probably the best option at the moment though). I'm not sure if trainer difficulty has much bearing on things, I have mine set at like 30 percent now (I think it's 50 by default). There's some stuff out there on picking the right trainer difficulty (if you put it too high you'll spin out on downhills with a smart trainer, as you go lower I believe you don't feel gradient changes and the trainer behaves a bit more like a dumb trainer). The thing that I thought the smart trainer would help with is drafting, but I honestly can't say it behaves much like the real world, in that if I caught up to a group that my resistance would drop with being in a draft. I haven't ever noticed that happening. But maybe I haven't messed around enough with the settings to where that would happen.

What I do love about smart trainers is erg mode, I've used trainerroad more than zwift and I find it much more enjoyable and in some ways easier to ride at a target power and comfortable cadence. Because of my schedule and family stuff I pretty much only ride indoors, so it's definitely been a great investment, especially since I've never actually been good at training outside.

miyata man

As much as you attempt to downplay the amount of idiocy represented in the cycling industry. Geometry didn't take 40 years to evolve into something that works. Fox and S didn't conduct a multi-year partnership to bring motorcycle geometry to the mtb world anymore than McLaren and S conducted a mutli-year partnership to bring F1 pit crew methodology to bike racing. The target in mtb has long been a low weight, efficient, and robust technical shock absorbing solution. If any of you want to state public belief all the ****ty BB formats, anodized parts, wheel sizes or anything else thrust outward were the product of more qualified minds I will continue laughing.

I found it odd you point out designing 29" frames as an example of progress, tetonrider. HYPE FLATBRAH BRAAAAP YOLO SWAG or any of the other colloquial grunts of people who blindly purchased yearly installations of that scheme will no doubt be a more receptive audience to your way of thinking. Which has nothing to do with my discussing technical implications of shock tuning on XC race bikes as a refined and time consuming process in addition to those found in road racing. Which I'm now abandoning due to the signal to noise ratio its attracting.

Best of luck with getting your bike sorted out on the first go Ttoc6. Apologies to everyone who rightfully felt this turned into an interruption.

caloso

Was going to race CX today but gut feels awful. I'm on an antibiotic for an infected cyst (yay) that's coming out next week. Been eating a lot of yogurt but I just don't think I can do 45 minutes of full gas without crapping my shorts.

TMI probably but this is one of the few places where people will get it.

rubiksoval

Antibiotics leave me wrecked for days. I mean, worse usually than the actual illness itself.

I abandon all hope of training when those come into play.

Hope you feel better quickly!

Ttoc6

Still trying to sell my current mtb. No thoughts about new mtb stuff until after that .

Had planned to take the (commuter) train south and ride about 10 miles to and from the cross race today. Rode to the train platform to see the train pulling away. I was 1 minute late... Oops, glad I hadn't tapped my card yet!

So I got in my car and drove there instead. Pretty much the worst cross race of my life. Started off sore since Ive been ramping volume back up and I'm a bit tired from the road training recently. Another burped tire(done with these tires, finding something new this week!). After the burp I more or less just practiced cornering. Finished two laps down when I'm usually top 5 or so. And I was hanging out about 4th when the burp happened. Oh well.

After my race was over I grabbed a coat and my repair kit and rode straight from the race up just past Mt. Timpanogos caves (Stage 6 of the Tour of Utah came down this descent). So pretty right now. So I tacked on about 40 minutes of sweetspot ish riding to get close to my assigned tss goal for the day. My power outside is probably 10% higher than on the trainer right now. Also probably helps it was a balmy ~35 degrees and I could push power without sweating my eyeballs out.

TheKillerPenguin

Thanks! They're quite comfy and feel markedly different when out of the saddle. Gotta figure out how to avoid scratching the bottom - my driveway is gravel!

Have some minor cold or allergies going on, so went out intending to do 4x15 if my breathing felt 100% normal, and called it a day after the first set to be safe. Legs feel really stellar at least! Had to hold back a ton to stay in zone.

aaronmcd

Air was better this morning. Went across the bridge, was going up Tam but it was closed due to fire danger or something. So descended to Stinson beach. Bad call. Didnt only smell like smoke, it avtually smelled like burning rubber. The air was hazy and there were only a few cars at the beach lots. Climbed back over and took a new for me route which was beautiful and not as smoky as the west side. Now I'm sitting at home feeling like a just chain smoked an entire pack of cigs.

caloso

It might be worse than that if you believe some of the reports.

tommyrod74

What you’ve just typed is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this chatroom is now dumber for having read it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul.

aaronmcd

What? Go on...

caloso

It's the particulates in wildfire smoke that's the issue.

tetonrider

you say stuff about shocks, @tommyrod74 says big strides have been made in geometry. you scoff at his claim and say nothing is new. i provide some examples of some stuff that is new and where genuine progress has been made.

i honestly don't get your response.

i asked, politely, if you do a long of long, steep descents on 29" wheels, as that's been the last area where smaller wheels still had an advantage, and i wondered where you are coming from when you express that opinion. have you compared 26, 27.5, 29" wheels on hardtails? on racy FS bikes? on big-hit bikes? riding lifts? in various regions? something else?

forgive me for TRYING to understand your point-of-view. others have written you off; i was giving you the benefit of the doubt. help me out.

i've been a mountain bike rider and racer for a LONG time, and i've been on many bikes over the years covering the full spectrum. as a racer, i care about what is fastest on-course. i do this by lots of testing. what i ride now is simply light-years ahead of what was available to me in the past. suspension is much, much better, and the 29" wheel size is faster for me (tested) in every scenario. i know what works for me, for my racing friends, for my casual riding friends, for my wife, and for my kid. It's not always the same thing, though there are many clear trends.

early 29ers had some promise but also some drawbacks in a few areas. improvements in wheels (light, stiff, wide) negated the downsides to larger wheels. better suspension brought back appropriate stiffness and the right weight. refined geometry improved upon geometry that worked for smaller wheels and was simply scaled up.

people expressed opinions different than yours, with actual experience to back it up. if your reaction is to leave the discussion instead of, say, clarifying your point or adding in some direct experience, then that's unfortunate. learning someone's background in an activity is useful to me as it gives me context for their statements. your lack of context here is telling; feel free to give us something to go on.

in general, i don't understand what informs your statements. this is the racing forum, so i'd expect it to be racing.

aaronmcd

How ia this worse than the poison in cigarettes? I smokes cigs for several years, until I quit, then smoked again a few years later, then switched to ecigs so I could race bikes. No way in hell I could race bikes while smoking cigs. Maybe cat 4 but not well.

mattm

I think it's more than ash, it's the toxic chemicals released when all the toxic stuff in the 7,500 home or however many that burned to the ground. I guess cigs have "toxic chemicals" in them too, but still.

Anyway, I'm going riding tomorrow. Been laying low all week, good timing for me since I wanted to rest anyway.

globecanvas

@tommyrod74 @tetonrider I enjoy mountain biking, but not as a racer. I did one MTB race about 4 years ago and pulled out halfway through because I got worried I was going to hurt somebody else.

What's fun about it for me is trying to get technically better. I don't even try to go fast, I try to go slow and work on balance and shifting weight over obstacles. I've gotten way better but still shamefully bad compared to my pro and ex-pro buddies. The gap in skills is just infinitely wide.

But I have absolutely no idea what suspension tuning even is. My bike has the specialized brain thing and I assume that is sort of like automatic suspension for dummies.

tommyrod74

The "brain" is an automated lockout (keep suspension from compressing). It's designed to differentiate between rider weight shifts from pedaling etc. and bumps on the trail. It's "lockout for dummies", but it doesn't absolve you from setting up the sag, rebound damping, etc. first.

You use the "brain fade" adjuster to select how big an impact it takes to disengage the lockout and open the suspension. The more you back off the "brain fade", the smaller an impact it takes to get the suspension moving and the more active it is overall.

I'd assume that ideally, you'd set that adjustment up last of all. I'll defer to Tetonrider here as I've ridden brain equipped bikes a fair bit but he seems to have more experience, but I'd assume you'd first back off the fade adjustment all the way (make the suspension as active as possible), set the sag (main air spring pressure), set rebound, then adjust the brain fade to make it as active or firm under pedaling as you prefer.

It would really be worth your time to have someone well versed in the system set it up properly for you, then leave it alone and ride. It will likely be an improvement over what you are used to. It would also be good for you to learn how to do it yourself, and what each adjustment does. It's really not very complicated and, as everyone (even Miyata Man) seems to agree, it will make a very noticeable difference to the ride when done correctly. If not set up to be usable, it's just extra weight to carry around.

miyata man

This last week my body has been very adamant it would have fuel but not fire. Funny how that happens I can enjoy the months of hard Winter weather but basically have to sit out two separate weeks of first temps in the initial drop to 30-40's and secondly 0-10. Thinking I'll throw on thin tights and go out for 3-4 hours easy today.

As to this other business. Suffice to say I see a fair amount of saddle time in far removed wilds. Of little consequence might also be the years of mtb riding in the area Ttoc6 moved to and beyond.

Ttoc6

So I bought a shock pump yesterday and checked the suspension on my mtb at home. Oops. Was running it all saggy like.. I'm talking like 100psi in the rear and it should be somewhere around 150 I'd guess. I'll try it out again at some point this week and report back whether I feel it climbs any better.

Got up this morning and hopped on the trainer for another 2 hour sweet spot workout. 7x10minutes with 5 min rest. This one went well. No problems at all, heart rate was very good and consistent. Only had to stop one time to fix the sun shining in on the optical sensor of my trainer again. Breakfast afterwards. I usually prefer to do my sub-threshold work in the mornings prior to food because I feel it helps burn fat and such.

My weight has also come down pretty good in the last week. I know I was carrying around some easy to lose weight after being away from home for a few weekends, but 8 lbs in a week isn't bad. And I'm doing it without starving myself like I have on past diets.

tetonrider

And your claim is... ?

29ers are slower, and you've ridden the same routes (up and down) on them and other wheel sizes?
Geometry of 29ers hasn't improved?
29ers did not get better at long/steep descents?
That suspension, esp for bigger-wheeled bikes, has not improved?

When did you live in Ogden? What were you riding there? On what bike(s)? Where do you live now? What's the terrain like?

Not being contentious, but I'm trying to give you the opportunity to provide some context for your opinions, and those answers would help.

@tommyrod74 races (and cares about what is fastest), and we know where he rides. We know the kind of terrain @globecanvas rides, and he does take note of time/effort(/power), even if he is doing it recreationally. Would be helpful to know something more than "i've ridden outside a bunch and *grumble grumble*."

Sometimes new stuff really IS better, and that doesn't mean people who know this are against YOU.

topflightpro

My local LBS is staffed by mostly MTB guys. They tend to be the type of guys who buy the best-bang-for-the-buck options available. They'll buy fancy gear if it is worth it.

That said, their general opinion of mountain bikes is don't buy anything more than 3 years old. The tech has improved so much as to make anything older than 3 years pretty much obsolete.

I trust their opinion, and it sides with what Teton and Tommyrod are saying.